


the world was on fire

by eddiespaghetti (foxwatson)



Series: to make me dream of you [2]
Category: IT (2017)
Genre: M/M, the losers are still very much here also
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 05:36:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12810750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxwatson/pseuds/eddiespaghetti
Summary: From the time Richie is 10 years old, and Stan teaches him and Bill and Eddie how to read cursive, he knows Eddie Kaspbrak is his soulmate.





	the world was on fire

**Author's Note:**

> so this is a companion to my fic "no one could save me but you" in that it's the same fic, but from richie's perspective. you can read them in either order, or you could read either as a standalone, that's up to you! the title from chris isaak's wicked game, just like the other fic and the larger series title.

From the time Richie is 10 years old, and Stan teaches him and Bill and Eddie how to read cursive, he knows Eddie Kaspbrak is his soulmate. He remembers everything that Stan said, and how he looked carefully at Bill’s arm, and he goes home and sits on his bed and stares down at his mark. It’s hard to tell from the angle - but it’d be backwards in the mirror. Still, he looks down and he traces the letters and he copies them out on a sheet of paper, and he recognizes Eddie’s neat signature immediately.

 

Eddie practices his signature all the time now that they’re learning how - it’s all over all his school notes, on the back of every empty page in his notebook. He practices and practices, carefully tracing out each letter, and he shows them all to Richie proudly.

 

Richie’s got terrible handwriting, and he knows it. He’s so bad that he sort of gives up on trying to make his signature any better, just settling for a sort of squiggle that looks like it might have an R at the beginning.

 

It doesn’t matter now, though. Eddie’s his soulmate. Eddie, who laughs at all of Richie’s jokes and then tells him he’s being dumb, and lets Richie borrow his comics, and who cleans Richie’s glasses for him whenever they get dirty, and lets him come over whenever as long as he takes his shoes off before they go upstairs. Richie likes Eddie more than anyone - not that he’d ever tell Bill or Stan, but now, of course, it makes sense. You’re supposed to like your soulmate more than anyone.

 

Well. Maybe his parents aren’t like that - maybe soulmates aren’t always like that. But Eddie makes Richie really happy, and Richie decides to tell him the very next day, as soon as he can, that Eddie’s his soulmate.

 

When he goes over to Eddie’s after school - their bikes ditched in the front yard, both of them piled together on Eddie’s bed, reading - that’s when Richie finally gets the nerve to say something.

 

His palms are sweating, so he wipes them off on the comforter, first, just in case.

 

“Eds-”

 

“Don’t call me that,” Eddie responds. Richie smiles, because Eddie always says that, but he’s never really mad.

 

“Eddie,” Richie says, after he’s gathered all his courage again.

 

Eddie closes his Fantastic Four comic and turns. “What is it, Rich?”

 

Richie bites his lip, worrying it between his teeth. He counts some of Eddie’s freckles, and feels himself calm down a little again. “Do you, uh. Do you know what your signature says? Your one. Is it... What does it say?”

 

He watches as Eddie blushes and looks down, and his smile widens. Then, Eddie speaks. “I don’t know. I can’t read it. Neither can my mom. Neither can Stan. I tried to get him to help. Nobody can read it. I’m not even sure it’s... a name. Or anything. Sometimes I think it might be a fake one or something.”

 

Fake. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with his parents’ ones too. Maybe there’s fake ones. “Oh. Can that happen?”

 

Eddie shakes his head, and shrugs, and Richie feels his chest start to hurt, and he scrunches the fabric of Eddie’s comforter in his hands just for a moment, and then wipes them off again and picks up his comic, trying to focus on something. He doesn’t have anything left to say - he doesn’t know what he could say.

 

He could tell Eddie, but it doesn’t seem fair, now. Maybe Eddie’s real one will show up when they get older. Maybe it’ll fix itself. He’ll just wait. He can wait.

 

They do get older. They meet Ben, and Ben’s already met his soulmate - only she’s his, too. Bev is nice and funny, and she laughs a lot, with her head thrown back, and Ben stares at her like she’s the sun. Richie knows the feeling - except Eddie always leans forward when he laughs, hunching in on himself, a hand over his mouth to try and stifle the giggles.

 

Something about Ben makes Richie trust him - he’s nice and he’s honest, and even if Ben and Bev both know, they don’t really seem settled yet, so Richie can still kind of sympathize with Ben. One day, in the hall at school, Richie pulls him over to talk.

 

“You go to the library a lot, right, Haystack?”

 

“Haystack?”

 

“Okay, the nickname isn’t the point, nerd alert. You go to the library a lot, right?”

 

Ben blinks at him, and nods. “Yeah, Richie. I used to go there all the time, before I met Beverly. Why are you suddenly interested in the library?”

 

“Is there... Do you know if there’s like books about soulmates and shit? Just about. Stories or whatever, or stuff about how it works. Nobody really seems like they can explain it to me.”

 

“Ms. Spencer probably could.”

 

Ms. Spencer is the frankly terrifying biology teacher. No fucking thanks.

 

“Yeah, no thanks, Haystack. Books? In the library? Are they real or just some wild fucking story you made up?”

 

“...Books?” Richie nods at him. “Yeah, they have books, Richie. And I used to do research on soulmates. I can tell you some stuff. Let me just write it down.”

 

They both go their separate ways, to classes, and Ben meets back up with him later to hand him a sheet of notebook paper with some scribbled out titles.

 

Ben’s handwriting is almost worse than his.

 

“Jesus, Haystack, how the fuck does anyone read this?”

 

Ben smiles, and shrugs. “Dunno. Teachers do their best, and. Well, actually with Bev I just got lucky. Our marks are right on our ankles, so I could see my own signature and show her it was mine.”

 

Richie nods, but mostly absentmindedly, because he’s already walking away from Ben, out of the school and towards the library.

 

He thinks about the fact that he’s never seen Eddie’s mark, and that they’ve all gone swimming at the quarry together, and Eddie’s still wasn’t visible, meaning it’s got to be on his hip somewhere, right around where Richie’s is.

 

Or maybe it’s on the complete opposite side - on his right hip instead of his left, and maybe that would mean they’re supposed to be mortal enemies or something. Who can fucking tell?

 

He leaves school before the day is technically over, just to make sure Eddie and Bill and Bev and Stan won’t see him, and he rides his bike to the library and makes it there without running into anyone. The librarian probably knows he’s still supposed to be in school, but he’s hoping that if he just doesn’t bother her, she won’t try to call the school or get him in trouble, and she’ll just leave him alone. Usually, if anybody knows anything about Richie, especially adults, they’re so grateful he’s decided to leave them alone that they’ll return the favor.

 

He scans the shelves for the books Ben listed, and he finds them all around the same place - Ben had helpfully told him the basic shelf locations for the call numbers he wrote down and the order they’d be in so that Richie didn’t even have to use the card catalog - which thank Christ, because he doesn’t have a fucking clue how it works.

 

With a pile of books in his arms, Richie settles down at one of the tables, and as much as he’s able, he begins to read.

 

It’s impossible for him to focus on big blocks of text like the ones in the books while he’s this worked up, but he reads around what he can. He uses the index to find anything he can about mistakes or people who don’t have the right mark or don’t get along.

 

He spends his afternoon reading stories of how some people marry their soulmates and then find out their soulmate was someone else with the same name, or of people who were born without marks because of some fucked up skin condition, or of people who married people with matching signatures but then were still unhappy. There’s a whole book about that - about people who don’t even believe in soulmates, because they aren’t always right.

 

_It’s a hint or a clue, maybe, but it’s not a done deal_ , someone says in one of the books. _If someone’s not right for you, they’re not right for you, no matter what some mark on your skin might say._

 

In one of the last books, he finds the word “mismatches” in the index. He flips to a page and reads. _While there have been no confirmed cases that we were able to locate, there have been stories throughout time of those who find a name and a signature on their skin but are unable to find a match with their supposed partner, who instead has a different name or signature on their skin. Clearly, since no confirmed case has been found, these are incredibly rare cases, and not something the general public need concern themselves with_.

 

Richie and Eddie clearly aren’t a part of the general public.

 

All Richie can think, sitting there staring out the library windows, is that the whole thing must be bullshit. If his parents weren’t the only sign he needed, then this is. That anyone could be born with the wrong mark or something is ridiculous - but that Eddie, who deserves happiness more than anyone else Richie’s ever met - if Eddie can be born with some kind of fucked up mark, born mismatched or not even matched to someone, then clearly the whole system’s just fucked, and Richie won’t have any part of it. Eddie deserves a soulmate, and one that’s perfect for him, but this book seems to just say that sometimes the universe messes up.

 

So. Fuck the universe.

 

The older they all get, the more things go on, the more Eddie seems to draw away from the group. Even when he comes to movie nights or sleepovers, he sits by himself and doesn’t talk much. He bikes home instead of spending the night.

 

By the time they all turn 16, and Bill finally meets Mike, Eddie’s almost completely absent from the big group hangouts. He calls and says his mom won’t let him come, or that he has doctor’s appointments or too much homework to do. Richie can’t really figure out why. He doesn’t love it either, with everybody paired off except Stan, and even Stan is fully confident that he’ll meet his soulmate one day, so Richie really does feel like the odd one out sometimes - and maybe that’s just it. Maybe Eddie feels the same way.

 

Just the two of them still hang out regularly. Richie goes by Eddie’s all the time and hangs out all afternoon. Sometimes Eddie comes over to his place when no one else is home and they lay on his bed and listen to music.

 

To test it out and see if he’s got the right idea, one night when he knows Bill is planning something, he asks Eddie to go to the arcade with him instead. Eddie smiles, and agrees, and they do that. It doesn’t feel great, breaking off from the rest of their friends, because Richie loves all of them, he loves Bill and Stan and has ever since they all first met, he loves Ben and Bev, and even though Richie hasn’t known him very long, he loves Mike, too. Mike is too nice for his own good, probably, and he smiles a lot, and he and Bill look really happy. They share a chair at every movie night, with Mike’s arm thrown around Bill’s shoulder, their hands still intertwined somehow, both of them whispering comments to each other and laughing.

 

Maybe Richie really can’t blame Eddie for Mike and Bill’s obvious affection being the last fucking straw.

 

They have a great time at the arcade with just the two of them, and they go back to Eddie’s after, because it’s not like Richie’s got anywhere else to be. Eddie even lets him spend the night for once.

 

Somehow, in the morning, Richie wakes up first. He watches Eddie, who’s curled up on his side, facing Richie. His hands are curled up by his face, too, and Richie brushes his own pinky against Eddie’s hand, which twitches a little, and then Richie pulls back. He goes back to just looking, staring at Eddie’s freckles, which are still there, and have been since they were kids. He realizes, right at that moment, that he wants to do this forever. He wants to always wake up next to Eddie, and see if he still has those freckles when they’re 80 years old, but that’s fucking ridiculous, because they’re 16.

 

At that point, Richie has to sit up, and shake himself. He sits on Eddie’s bed and stares at the wall until he can force himself to get up, and then he goes to get dressed - and thankfully when he comes back, Eddie is awake, and Richie can tell him he’s going to go downstairs and have some breakfast - which he does.

 

In spite of the awkwardness his realization has sparked, Eddie seems like he’s in a good mood, and Richie finds that it puts him a little more at ease - it’s a good distraction, so he can stop thinking about his own shitty thoughts and his own shitty situation.

 

Eddie suggests they go to the quarry, so they do.

 

They’re there until the afternoon, and that means they’ve been hanging out together for over twenty-four hours, which is crazy, but it’s also really nice. Richie finds he can be a little quieter, feel a little calmer - even if part of his being quiet is still that he’s afraid he’ll blurt out some shit about what he was thinking that morning.

 

He’s standing by the cliff, tossing rocks to see how far they go and how they splash in the water, when Eddie speaks up behind him.

 

“Rich. What’s your mark say? Your signature?”

 

Richie finds that his fingers are suddenly useless, so he fumbles the rock he was holding and turns his head so fast his glasses nearly fall off. He pushes them back up. “Uh. Why, Eds?”

 

This is the one question he was always glad Eddie hadn’t asked when they were 10, and now that they’re 16, especially today of all days, he doesn’t fucking know what to say. He can’t forget the conclusions he came to when he finally did research.

 

Eddie finally speaks again. “Just. You asked me about mine like a million years ago, I never asked about yours. Is there something wrong with yours too?”

 

He can’t lie that much. “It, uh. I mean. I can read it.”

 

“Oh. What’s it say?”

 

To gain himself some time, Richie bends down and picks up another rock, turns it over in his hand to feel its smooth, cool surface. He looks down at the water, stares into it, even where it’s dark. He doesn’t have the guts. He knows he doesn’t.“...Amy Thompson.”

 

“Like from school?”

 

Richie winces, but he’s still facing away, so maybe Eddie doesn’t catch it. “No, not like - I mean we don’t match. She’s got somebody else’s name so that’s. I mean either it’s another Amy Thompson, cause it’s like a name, right, or we’re just. Mismatched somehow.”

 

“Can that... Can that happen?” Eddie asks. His voice is quiet - barely there.

 

Richie shrugs. Books say it can, don’t they? Even if it’s only rumored or whatever. “I don’t know. It’s possible, isn’t it?”

 

“Did you have her sign her name to check?”

 

Disgusted with himself, Richie tosses the rock he was holding straight down at the water and turns around so he only hears the splash. “I’m not even sure I believe in soulmates, Eds. I mean if yours is all fucked up and people can get matched wrong, and then there’s. There’s too many people around here who shouldn’t fucking be together or got hurt trying to be with somebody just because some shitty birthmark, basically, says they should, it’s all just bullshit.”

 

Fuck the universe. He’s sticking by that.

 

Eddie blinks at him. “What about Bill and Mike? Or Ben and Bev?”

 

Scoffing, Richie kicks at the dirt, looks down at his own dirty Vans. “Fucking good for them, I guess.” He knows he sounds too bitter, too jealous, he knows he’s being obvious, and he hates it. Still, his soulmate’s sitting on a rock, asking him about soulmate shit, when it’s all so bullshit that Eddie doesn’t even have a match, so he can’t know if Richie is his, and Richie would feel like he was trapping Eddie somehow if he told him.

 

Eddie says something, and Richie looks up to see him walking over. “Rich...” he murmurs, and Richie can only swallow.

 

He reaches his arms out, and his hands curl over Richie’s shoulders, and there’s no way Richie could say no to a thing like that, so he steps closer and wraps his own arms around Eddie’s waist. Then Eddie’s arms go fully around Richie’s shoulders, and Richie puts his face against Eddie’s neck, and then Richie shivers a little to feel Eddie’s fingers shift through his hair. They stand there, in the chill, holding each other. It’s almost enough. Not quite, but almost.

 

After that day, whether it’s the conversation about soulmates they had or the fact that they spent that full day and night together, Richie finds that he and Eddie spend more time together than ever. It’s almost like the conversation went differently, and Eddie knows that he’s Richie’s soulmate - it feels like they’re soulmates. Richie tries not to think that too often, but it crosses his mind more than he’d like to admit.

 

They go back to hanging out with the group a little more, because Eddie will go as long as he can go with Richie, and it’s like all of them are paired off except for Stan - who’s only ever amused at the fact that he’s basically surrounded by couples.

 

Whenever the group goes to the quarry, and Ben and Bev splash each other and watch the others make fools of themselves, and Bill and Mike are diving to look for turtles under the water, Richie and Eddie have moments to themselves, too, and Richie tries to dunk Eddie under the water, only for Eddie turn on him and shove him under instead. Richie just likes the excuse to touch Eddie, to feel his hands slip against Eddie’s bare shoulders, or to run his fingers through Eddie’s wet hair and mess it up.

 

Eddie grows his hair out a little more as they get older, and Richie uses it as an excuse to touch it whenever he can - Eddie follows suit and ruffles Richie’s curls in retaliation, and it’s in those moments, when they’re touching in at least eight different places and all of them spark and burn at Richie’s skin, that Richie knows there’s some kind of thin magnetic connection between them. There’s something there - there has to be.

 

Then the moment passes, again.

 

Still. Those little moments mean a lot, and there's plenty of them scattered over the next couple of years.

 

Once, he talks the whole group into going to the arcade together - which is one of his proudest moments, generally speaking. He suggests an air hockey tournament, just to keep everyone sort of involved and from splitting off, and Stan gets really official - breaking out a notebook from seemingly nowhere to draw up a bracket so things can stay organized.

 

Someone has to play an extra game so that it works even with their odd number, so Mike volunteers, because of course he does. He’s still too nice for his own good.

 

So Mike plays Bill and beats him, mostly just because Bill’s reflexes are a little slow - maybe it’s just because his hair keeps falling in his eyes. Then he loses to Stan, but both of them move on to the next stage, because of the weird uneven numbers.

 

Richie plays Ben and wins, probably just because his arms are longer. Bev plays Eddie and beats him by a very slight margin - he’s quick, and he’s good, but Bev’s probably the best of all of them at any given game in the arcade, and Eddie can’t quite best her. Richie pulls him into a consolatory hug from behind afterwards, and Eddie just smiles and leans against him, and doesn’t even try to push him away.

 

Mike and Bev play, and he loses to her - he’s a gracious loser, and gives her a hi five after.

 

Richie plays Stan, then, and mostly seems to win out of his sheer unpredictability - mostly meaning that nothing he does even makes sense to him, he sort of just whacks the puck wherever it goes and tries not to get it in his own goal, and hopes. So Stan loses, and throws up his hands out of sheer frustration, but Bill and Mike joke with him about it and he cracks a smile.

 

It’s down, then, to Richie and Bev. Before the game, Richie goes over to Eddie.

 

“Kiss for good luck?” he asks, and leans down, turning his cheek towards Eddie. To his surprise, Eddie does actually kiss him on the cheek, in the arcade, in front of everyone, and Richie breaks out into a grin.

 

“Shut up and go kick Bev’s ass to avenge me,” Eddie says, but he’s smiling back.

 

It’s an intense game, and Bev’s definitely not taking it easy on him. So much so, in fact, that one time she whacks the puck so hard it goes flying off the table and hits Richie in the face.

 

Eddie’s immediately concerned, but Richie waves him off. “We gotta finish the game first, Eds! Waste of quarters.”

 

Richie’s lip feels sort of weird, but he’s determined to finish the game - and somehow he wins. When he turns to face everyone and cheers, Eddie looks at him with horror.

 

“Richie, oh my god.”

 

Everyone shoves him towards the bathroom, and he realizes he’s got a split lip - from a fucking air hockey puck.

 

He laughs, and Eddie immediately punches him in the arm. “Stop! You’re gonna make it worse. Idiot.”

 

Eddie shoves him around until Richie’s seated on the counter with Eddie between his legs, and then he pulls Richie down by his collar so he can dab at his lip with a wet paper towel. “You’re such an idiot. Only you would get a split lip in an air hockey tournament.”

 

“But I won! I avenged you, just like you said,” Richie says around the paper towel.

 

Eddie pauses what he’s doing, and smiles up at Richie, and Richie feels all the breath go out of him just from the look on Eddie’s face. “Yeah. Well. Thank you for that. But you’re still a fucking idiot.”

 

“But you love me,” Richie says, and it comes out more vulnerable than he intended.

 

“Yeah I do. Asshole.”

 

His lip scabs over, and heals, but because he didn’t want to go to the hospital, he always has a scar from that day - but he only smiles to think of it. To think of all his friends, laughing and cheering and yelling, and to think of Eddie cleaning him up after. It’s a good kind of scar.

 

It months and months after that when he and Eddie start applying to schools and working on their applications together. Due to his very shitty handwriting, it ends up being sort of like a magazine quiz, with Eddie asking him questions, Richie relaying the answers, and Eddie writing them down because if Richie did it, they’d be illegible.

 

Then they make it to the signature line.

 

“Here, you just need to sign it down there at the bottom,” Eddie says to him, holding out the application.

 

Richie hates his own signature, still. Partly because he never bothered to get very good at it, and partly because it’s all a part of how the universe at large has fucked him over. “Eds, your handwriting is so much nicer than mine, you know mine’s shit, can’t you just do it?”

 

“Rich, you’re basically signing, like, a contract, that’s so illegal. There’s no way I’m signing your name for you. Just sign it.”

 

He shoves the paper at Richie again, so Richie finally grabs it, then huffs out a sigh and scribbles a little signature on the line. It’s as messy and awful as ever, and Richie’s frowning down at it when Eddie speaks again.

 

“Richie-” he says, but it sounds choked and just... wrong. As soon as Richie looks over, he can tell Eddie’s having a panic attack.

 

Immediately, he crawls across the bed to put his hands on Eddie’s face. “Eddie, baby, what is it? Come on, breathe.” He starts to try and even out his own breathing so that Eddie can copy it, and then he decides to try cracking a joke, too. “God, my signature’s not that bad, is it?”

 

Somehow, even near tears and halfway into a panic attack, Eddie laughs. It’s a little wheezy, but it’s a good sign, so Richie smiles at him.

 

Unfortunately, the laugh seems to have made it worse, because Eddie starts to panic again. Richie keeps his hands on Eddie’s face, keeps his eyes locked with Eddie’s, and just breathes. He only has the focus for Eddie when he’s like this - there’s no room for speculation on why he might be panicking, because whatever Eddie might need is more important.

 

Once Eddie’s breathing finally has calmed down, Richie asks again, “Eds, what is it?”

 

“I just. It sort of. Became real? When you signed it, I just realized that we’re doing this, the whole. College thing and we’re gonna go off, and like, God what if you get in somewhere you really wanna go and they don’t accept me, then what are we gonna do?”

 

Fortunately, unlike a lot of the panic attacks Eddie has had, this one has a solution that Richie can help with. He smiles. “Eds. Don’t be silly. We’re gonna go somewhere we both get in - we picked a whole fucking. List of schools. I’m not gonna just run off without you. What would I do without my little Eddie Spaghetti?” Once he’s said that, overwhelmed still with the relief that Eddie hasn’t changed his mind or anything else, Richie starts pressing smacking kisses all over Eddie’s face, and he can hear Eddie start to giggle, so he just keeps going, trying to kiss each and every one of Eddie’s freckles, then his nose, then his ears.

 

Once Eddie seems to be tired out from laughing, Richie presses one last kiss against Eddie’s temple, and then lays down on top of Eddie, covering him like a blanket. Eddie’s hand ends up in Richie’s curls again, and Richie has to resist the urge to nuzzle into Eddie’s neck.

 

“I mean it, Eds,” Richie says quietly. “I’m not going anywhere without you.”

 

“You’d better not,” Eddie says back. Richie doesn’t even know how to tell him that he’s not sure he could, anymore.

 

Things are still good, maybe better than ever, leading up to graduation. They’ve reached a point now where Richie sleeps over at Eddie’s or Eddie sleeps over at Richie’s every single night. It depends on which parents are home and what they think they can get away with, but they always share a bed, and they always fall asleep together.

 

Once, Eddie even wakes him up with a kiss to the cheek, and Richie smiles up at him, fonder than he probably should be while he’s still fuzzy with sleep. Eddie’s only a blur without his glasses, but he’s a very lovable blur.

 

The problem comes three weeks before graduation, when Richie wakes up to the sounds of Eddie having a panic attack.

 

It’s his first instinct to reach over and pull Eddie close, but Eddie pushes him away, which stings more than it should. He blinks sleep from his eyes and finds his glasses, so he can find out what’s really going on, and that’s when he sees Eddie wordlessly gesturing at his hip.

 

Every part of Richie goes cold, and he looks down to see that the signature on his hip is exposed. He tugs at his shirt, pulling it down to hide it, but he still feels vulnerable and wrong. He keeps his arms wrapped around himself. He starts to babble, just hoping that something he says will fix it. “Eds. Eddie. Look, it’s not - I mean I can’t change the name I’ve got, I can’t change what’s on here, If I could-”

 

Before Richie can even try to finish what he’s saying, Eddie runs off, and Richie hears the bathroom door slam.

 

Richie looks back down at the name on his hip, runs his finger across it. Even if he could change it, he wouldn’t. He’s tied to Eddie in pretty much whatever way he can be at this point - he doesn’t know what he’ll do if Eddie doesn’t feel the same way.

 

After a moment, Richie pulls himself together and goes to the bathroom. He tries the door and finds it locked, so he smacks at it with an open hand. “Eddie, don’t. Please don’t.”

 

The terror has started to overwhelm him again - he’s not used to Eddie pushing him away - he actually can’t think of a time that’s ever happened. They fix things together, even when they fight, and they’ve never fought for real. Not like this. Richie doesn’t know how to put pieces like this back together and not fuck it up.

 

“You lied, why would you lie? Why’d you lie?” Eddie’s voice is panicked, muffled behind the door.

 

“I didn’t...” Well. Technically he did. Richie presses his forehead against the door. “Eddie I don’t wanna do this through a fucking door.”

 

Richie can hear a thump on the other side of the door. Then silence.

 

“I don’t want to do this at all. Can you leave, please?” Eddie says.

 

“Eds...”

 

“Don’t call me that. Just. Leave, Richie.”

 

If Eddie really does want him to leave, then he should probably leave. Feeling numb, Richie wanders downstairs. He makes it out the door before he realizes he’s barefoot, and in his pajamas, and it’s fucking freezing outside. He goes back in, and goes back to the door, knowing Eddie’s on the other side.

 

Richie can hear him crying, and he knows he has to at least try and get Eddie to understand. He can’t just give up. “Eddie. Please just let me explain. Don’t... Can you just open the door? Don’t make me leave like this.”

 

“Give me a minute,” Eddie says, and Richie sighs.

 

He steps back so the door has room to open, and the Eddie standing behind it makes Richie feel ashamed to even look at him. It’s obvious he’s been crying, but also obvious that he’s stopped and cleaned himself off, and also that he’s genuinely mad at Richie. That’s not something that Richie really knows how to handle. He looks at the floor.

 

After a moment, since Eddie’s clearly not going to break the silence, Richie speaks. “I. I knew your mark was... inconclusive, or what the fuck ever. You told me. When we were kids. So when I knew mine was you, but yours didn’t have to be me, I figured you had an out. I wanted to let you have it. Only then you asked me, and I didn’t know how to tell you that everything just... was shit, you know, so I sort of lied. Not completely, because I let you think I was mismatched, but I didn’t want you to feel bad. I just figured with yours all fucked and mine matched to you with no way to-”

 

“Mine’s not fucked up, you idiot.”

 

That makes Richie look up, and he blinks at Eddie, confused. “What? What does that mean?”

 

“It means I.... It means I figured it out. A while ago. While we were still applying for colleges. Before we’d got our stuff back.”

 

Eddie has a soulmate. Eddie knows who his soulmate is. Richie wants to run off again, wants to pull Eddie close and beg him to stay anyways - he doesn’t do either. “...Who is it?”

 

“Just... look at it.” Eddie pulls up his shirt, pushes down his pyjama shorts, and once Richie can focus on the right patch of skin - his hip, the same side and same place that Richie’s is - he can recognize it as his own signature.

 

His own signature, which Eddie would have really seen for the first time just the other day, because Richie never wanted to practice his signature as a kid, and definitely wasn’t showing it off. “That’s why you had a panic attack when we were applying for college.”

 

“Yeah. Because that’s the only thing that was fucked up. Was your fucking... shitty handwriting.”

 

The fact that Richie’s to blame for all of the confusion doesn’t really make him feel any better. Then he realizes that Eddie kept the truth from him on purpose that day - he wasn’t freaking out about college at all. He turns Eddie’s own words from earlier back on him. “Then why did _you_ lie?”

 

Eddie frowns at Richie. “You told me yours was Amy Thompson! I thought we were-” He pauses. “After all that shit you said, I thought you were right, I thought mine was fucked up and we were mismatched, because that would be about my fucking luck, after all the trouble it’s given me. So I didn’t say anything or do anything because there was supposed to be some girl out there you were matched to, probably, you were just... Not gonna find her for a while or maybe didn’t want to, but I wasn’t going to take the option away from you like that.” There’s another moment of silence, and Richie fights the urge to just laugh at the idea that his soulmate could be anyone but Eddie. “But you! You... Rich, you knew the whole time that I was yours, and whatever your stupid reasons, you knew mine was just unreadable, but I. I used to practice my handwriting so it would be neat, I used to sign everything for practice, you used to watch me do it. I thought the only way, that it... I was doing it so they. You’d. Whoever could... Read it and know. But you... And then you haven’t...”

 

A lot of Eddie’s sentences were unfinished, and all their possibilities linger in the air. Richie feels choked with them. “I haven’t what?”

 

“You just never said anything. And you could have. I don’t know.”

 

Richie sighs. Maybe there are no possibilities. Making he’s making something out of nothing. Maybe he’s just too fucking late. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I lied, Eds. Do you still want me to go?”

 

“Do you want to go?” Eddie asks.

 

“That’s really up to you, it’s your house,” Richie mutters in response. He fights the urge to shrug.

 

When Richie brings himself to look back up, Eddie’s shaking his head. “You’re the one that thinks all this stuff is just bullshit - I guess that’s up to you.”

 

There’s a moment of quiet, because Richie can’t tell what Eddie wants him to say, and then Eddie walks past Richie, careful not to touch him, and goes back into his room. It’s the closest Eddie’s come to him this morning, since he shoved Richie away when they woke up. Richie can’t shake the fact that Eddie’s response to finding out Richie was his soulmate for sure was that. A panic attack. A shove.

 

Still. “I don’t really know that I’d say it’s bullshit,” Richie says from the door.

 

Eddie turns back to face him, clearly surprised.

 

It takes all the courage Richie isn’t even sure he has to pull his words together. “I mean. There’s something here, right? And like you said last time, Mike and Bill are happy, Ben and Bev are happy, and I’m happy for them, I’m just. I’m jealous, too.”

 

“Yeah. I know. I was, too,” Eddie replies.

 

That throws Richie off more than anything. “You _were_?”

 

“Well before we... I mean before there were two of us, you know? Ever since we talked that day and things were... A little different, you know, I felt better. I guess with things... You know since this is... We’re... Whatever, that makes sense. Right?”

 

Eddie clearly can’t even bring himself to say it - that he’s matched with Richie. It hurts.

 

“You mean since we match?”

 

Eddie looks down at the ground, shrugs. “Yeah. That.”

 

He still won’t say it. He still won’t come anywhere near Richie. It’s obvious that something about the idea of being soulmates has ruined them. Richie’s chest aches all over, like his heart just shattered and the pieces went fucking everywhere. He rubs at the pain with the heel of his hand. He suggests the only thing he can think of to fix it - the only thing he thinks in that moment that Eddie might agree to. “Do you think... Do you think maybe there can be platonic soulmates?”

 

Still - for whatever reason, as Richie watches through stinging eyes, fighting the urge to cry, he can still see clearly enough to tell that Eddie’s shoulders curl in. “I don’t know. It’s possible. I don’t... know enough about this, Rich,” Eddie says. He’s obviously hurt.

 

Richie’s completely at a loss. “Eds, I can’t figure out what you want me to do.”

 

He expects a couple of different responses, none of them good. Most of them involve Eddie just kicking him out, because it was different when they were just wasting time together, but being linked to Richie for life was clearly not something Eddie signed up for.

 

Instead of any of that, Eddie blurts out, “You’ve never kissed me.”

 

Richie looks back up, almost thinking he’s hallucinated, but Eddie is blushing, and biting his lip. Richie blinks and tries to answer. “I- What?”

 

“You’ve never... You’ve known this whole time that I was yours, and we’ve been doing whatever it is we’re doing for like a year and a half, and I’m pretty sure everyone else thinks we’re already matched or whatever but you’ve never... done anything like that or even tried. I mean there’s like kisses on the cheek and stuff and that one time after I freaked out about your signature, but... I don’t know why you’re asking me about staying platonic when it’s pretty obvious what you wanna do, I’m not gonna ask you to do stuff just to make an idiot out of myself. You won’t even touch me right now. I’ll be platonic, I’ll do whatever you want, just. Don’t. Don’t let it mean I have to go to college alone, or that everything’s fucked up.”

 

Something like hope sparks in Richie’s chest. Relief starts to sweep over him. Eddie just has no fucking clue. “You think I don’t wanna kiss you?”

 

This time, when Eddie just shrugs a little, still looking small and sad, Richie thinks maybe he can fix it after all.

 

“Eddie. Eds. C’mere,” he says, and he puts a hand on Eddie’s shoulder.

 

Apparently that’s all it takes, because Eddie wraps his arms tightly around Richie’s waist, holding on like he thinks Richie’s going somewhere. Still scared but still hoping, Richie holds him just as tightly, arms around Eddie’s waist and his shoulders, keeping him just as close.

 

“I’m sorry,” he can feel Eddie murmur.

 

Richie sighs, hurt to think of all the ways he's sort of responsible. “I’m sorry, too, Eds. I mean. Mostly I’m sorry about my fucking shit handwriting, but I’m sorry about lying, too, it was - that was fucking stupid. I’m sorry.”

 

Eddie lifts his head up to look up at Richie, and Richie looks back at him, still trying not to break. As much as he thinks things are going to work out, everything still feels fragile - like he could misstep here and still fuck it all up. Eddie reaches up and pushes his curls off his face with one hand, and Richie leans into the touch.

 

“It doesn’t really matter, Rich, I just. I freaked out because I was scared about how you’d react, as long as... As long as we’re okay, it doesn’t matter.”

 

“Are we okay?” Richie asks. He can’t hide his own nerves - he can’t play cool right now, or pretend somehow that he’s not scared out of his fucking mind.

 

“Yeah, Rich. Of course we are,” Eddie says, and he leans up to kiss Richie on the cheek. That kiss is the only proof Richie really needed - Eddie meant what he said earlier. Richie catches him with a hand at the back of his neck.

 

They’re so close their noses are still brushing. “Eds...” Richie says quietly, and then he presses his lips against Eddie’s, just briefly. It’s nothing special, mostly just lips against lips, but it’s their first kiss, for both of them, and just the thought of that is enough for Richie.

 

“Oh,” Eddie says quietly. Then he leans up and presses his lips against Richie’s, kissing him back, but this time the kiss turns desperate and Richie knows that Eddie wants him, too.

 

They both only barely know what they’re doing, mostly from movies more than anything else, but Richie can feel Eddie press close, so he presses his own hands against Eddie’s back and leans down into the kiss. Eddie licks into Richie’s mouth, and Richie slides their tongues against each other and shivers. Eddie bites at his lower lip, and Richie presses his teeth just barely against Eddie’s tongue because he wants all that he can get.

 

When they pull apart, Eddie’s eyes are as dark as Richie’s ever seen them. It’s sort of ridiculously hot - Eddie is sort of ridiculously hot. His lips are a little swollen, and Richie’s still staring when Eddie leans in for one last kiss, a gentler, lingering one, with both of their mouths still slightly open.

 

“So... not platonic, then,” Richie says as Eddie pulls away again.

 

Eddie laughs, and he leans forward like always, and it means his cheek brushes against Richie’s and he ends up with his his nose and face pressed right at Richie’s jaw. “Yeah, no. Not exactly,” he replies.

 

Richie knows that he’s still flushed, and he glances down at Eddie’s curls and the top of his head. He’s a total fucking goner, more than ever. “Yeah, good. That’s good with me. I can handle that.”

 

Pulling back, Eddie looks up at him again, and they both smile. “I love you,” Eddie says. Then after a pause, “I mean. I’m in love with you. I have been for... a while. Maybe the whole time.”

 

With that statement, everything feels settled. Richie grins. “Yeah, well, we’re soulmates, aren’t we? Makes sense that you can’t resist me.”

 

“Richie,” Eddie grumbles, but he’s still smiling, too. Richie feels a poke at his side.

 

He tilts his head and gives up the joke. “Alright. I love you, too, obviously, I’m also in love with you, you’re fucking perfect and it’s ridiculous that somehow you got stuck with me but I’m also fucking delighted. Better?”

 

Eddie kisses Richie again, and Richie kisses back, helpless to resist. Then Eddie murmurs against his mouth, “No, not exactly, because you’re being ridiculous, but it is better, so I’ll take it. I’m not stuck with you. I love you. You’re my soulmate. Asshole.”

 

“See? You know I’m an asshole.”

 

“Stop it!” Eddie says, and he shoves Richie playfully so they both topple onto the bed. In a mirror of the day of the application fiasco, Eddie leans in and presses kisses all over Richie’s face, and Richie closes his eyes against all the kisses and laughs and laughs.

 

Eventually he puts a hand on Eddie’s jaw and pulls him into a real kiss, just because his stomach hurts from laughing. When they pull apart from that, they just lie there, Eddie on top of Richie, and Richie looks up at him, just staring.

 

“You’re really stuck with me now. For college, and everything else,” he says.

 

“Yeah, good. You’re not getting rid of me either. Not anymore,” Eddie says back.

 

Eddie finally lays down, fully on top of Richie, and Richie puts his arms around Eddie’s waist to keep him there.

 

In just a few weeks, they’ll graduate, and they’ll go off to school, and they’ll keep falling asleep and waking up together, and Richie’s more determined than ever to make that happen now up until he dies, because really, Eddie is his soulmate. He was right. Fuck the universe, whatever, the universe has nothing to do with it - the two of them fell in love and they picked each other, and if anything the universe still tried to fuck them up, but Richie’s not gonna let that happen. Clearly Eddie isn’t either. Richie’s good with that.

**Author's Note:**

> i just really like. i'm always thinking a lot in my fics about what richie's thinking and why he says and does what he does right? and for this fic that was all just so like. lingering and overwhelming i wanted to get some of it out? so take that and also some additional like loser tomfoolery and headcanons and i'll try to write another real fic soon, i'm sorry. <3
> 
> also! as always if you wanted to send me a writing prompt for anything reddie at eddykaspbraks on tumblr, i definitely take writing prompts!!


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